SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/10/2016 8:00 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
Coronation
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Zechariah 6:12-13
Message of the verses: “12 “Then say to him, ’Thus says the LORD of
hosts, "Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for He will branch out from
where He is; and He will build the temple of the LORD. 13 “Yes, it is He who
will build the temple of the LORD, and He who will bear the honor and sit and
rule on His throne. Thus, He will be a priest on His throne, and the counsel of
peace will be between the two offices."’”
Zechariah
did not tell the visitors what he was doing until he took them to see Joshua
the high priest and perhaps he brought the elders of Israel along with him
since this was such an important thing to do.
After they
were all together Zechariah explained to them the vision that the Lord had
given him. Dr. Wiersbe writes “He must
have told them that both Zerubbable and Joshua were ‘men symbolic of things to
come’ (Zech. 3:8 NIV). ‘"‘Listen, O high priest Joshua and your associates
seated before you, who are men symbolic of things to come: I am going to bring
my servant, the Branch.’ Even though
Zerubbable was from David’s line, he wasn’t the one God chose to be
crowned. God chose Joshua and for the
first time in Jewish history, the Lord united the monarchy and the
priesthood.” I can’t help but think that
the OT name of our Lord is Joshua, and this has to be something that was planed
and in the heart of God to do this at this point in history.
We know
from history that this has to be a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ as He is
not only King but also our High Priest.
Look at verse 12 “behold a man” and we will quote an endnote from Dr.
Wiersbe “The statement ‘Behold the man’ (vs. 12) reminds us of what Pilate said
to the Jews in John 19:5 when he presented Christ to them. It reminds us of the Gospel of Luke, the
Gospel of the Son of Man. ‘Behold my
servant’ (Isa. 42:1) reminds us of Mark, the Gospel of the Servant; ‘Behold
your king’ (Zechariah 9:9) relates to Matthew, the Gospel of the King; and
‘Behold your God’ (Isa. 40:9) reminds us of the Gospel of John, the Gospel of
the Son of God.” Now that is some good
stuff!!
This surely
pictures our Lord as being both King and Priest and also when we fast forward
to the Millennial Kingdom we will see that it will be Jesus who will build the
Millennial temple. I once heard Hal
Lindsey speak on when Jesus said that if they destroy this temple I will raise
it up in three days, and of course this spoke of the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead, but Lindsey committed that it would be entirely possible
that Jesus would build the Millennial temple in three days. Perhaps he is correct.
The only
king who tried to be a priest in the OT was Uzziah and God gave him leprosy
when he tried to do this. No priest had
ever tried to be king as seen in the OT.
Dr. Wiersbe writes “Today, Jesus Christ serves in heaven as both King
and Priest, ministering ‘after the order of Melchizedek’ (Heb. 7-8). This is the fulfillment of the Father’s
promise to the Son recorded in Psalm 110:4 ‘The LORD has sworn and will not
change His mind, "You are a priest forever According to the order of
Melchizedek.’”
While we
studied the book of Ezekiel and got to the very difficult chapters of 40-48 we
saw that there will indeed be a priesthood during the Millennial kingdom. Zechariah 14:16 reads “Then it will come
about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will
go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to
celebrate the Feast of Booths.” Yes the
Bible tells us in many OT places that there will be a kingdom and the NT tells
us the length of it 1,000 years. Dr.
Wiersbe writes in an endnote something that is near and dear to my heart: “Some people ‘spiritualize’ these kingdom
prophecies and relate them to the church today rather than to a restored Israel
in the future. That there are present-day
applications of Old Testament passages, no honest student would deny; for the
only ‘Bible’ the first-century church had was the Old Testament. But there’s a
difference between application and interpretation. Each passage has only one basic
interpretation, even though there may be several applications.” You can see if you have read what I have
written in earlier SD’s about this subject that Dr. Wiersbe was much kinder to
those who believe these lies.
As we look
at verse thirteen in the NIV it reads “It is he who will build the temple of
the LORD, and he will be clothed with majesty and will sit and rule on his
throne. And he will be a priest on his throne. And there will be harmony between the two.’” The NASB says “and the counsel of peace will
be between the two offices."’” We
see that in the Millennial Kingdom there will be peace between the “religious”
and the civil government, something that has not been true for a long time, if
ever as there seems to always be unrest between these two different aspects of
life on earth.
6/10/2016 8:34 PM
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